


you must keep your soul / like a secret in your throat

by sailorwednesday



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Everyone Needs A Hug, M/M, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:27:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26434912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sailorwednesday/pseuds/sailorwednesday
Summary: In an alternate universe, heaven and hell have different priorities.For centuries, they have been locked in a struggle against the threat of vampirism.Demons serve as highly skilled vampire hunters intent on completely eradicating the corruption. Angels protect the remaining human strongholds and cleanse the areas that have been cleared of vampiric infestation. Infernal and Divine Beings can't be killed, but if their bodies sustain enough damage, they are re-made and their memories wiped.In a new body, Crowley doesn't know who he is, or the strange angel that he keeps running in to, and he just wants to go home. But-- what would that even look like?
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> * I ticked violence warning because I didn't want anyone to be surprised, there's creepy vampires and sword fighting but honestly probably more PG-13 than R rated in this chapter.  
> ** this whole idea came to me while listening to mcr vampires will never hurt you on repeat, if you want music pairing inspo

He jolted back awake, surprised, and blinked until he was able to see. Except, there really wasn’t anything to see, just a grey sky and long expanse of desolate land. _Fuck, not again_ . Nothing hurt, that was a good sign. He patted himself down, taking stock. Long hair, red again. _Why is it always red?_ All the normal, human appendages. He was wearing clothes this time, and that was good too. Some kind of utilitarian pants and a jacket with too many pockets and some sort of belt. Carefully, he rolled into a crouch. It was always hard the first few hours in a new body, nauseous and itchy. He didn't know how it was that he knew these things.

He was alone, which was also standard. Or, at least he thought it was. He couldn’t remember. That felt familiar, too. Something told him this was how it always was, how it always had to be. He knew things, knew how the rules worked, but when he tried to reach deeper, to remember other bodies he had lived in, other places he had lived in, he couldn’t. He knew he was ancient. He knew he couldn’t break this cycle. He knew he couldn’t die. He knew he had to help...Someone. That stirred something. Flashes of battles. Blood: golden and black and red all mixed together. Fear. Longing. He shivered, standing now. He knew that he would receive instructions soon, he always did. They just appeared in his head, and that was it, so there was nothing to do but wait. He could try to figure out this world, see where he was. That seemed like a good use of time. Concentrating, he began to walk. Learning the way the feet moved, the way the fabric of his clothing felt. 

This world seemed empty. He had been walking for what felt like a long time, only he couldn’t tell because the sky was still the same oppressive grey. No stars, no planets. As he walked farther away from wherever he had landed, he passed a few rocky cairns, what looked like abandoned farming equipment, a burned out car. They were old, rusted iron hunks. He wasn’t sure how he knew what they were, but he did. He felt so tired, only that didn’t make any sense, because he hadn’t even done anything yet. He kept walking. 

And then, in the flash of a moment, he wasn’t alone any more. Or maybe he was, and whatever was speaking to him was speaking inside of him. Its voice, gravelly and echoey was everywhere at once. He felt someone sifting through the hidden parts of his mind, the parts that were just out of his reach, like a Roladex. _What the hell is a Roladex?_ And it was too much, all of it suddenly, overwhelmed, he dropped to his knees. And then he knew things. 

_The humans had done something wrong. They had been corrupted. It had to be stopped. They had to be stopped._

**He shuddered as the memory took hold. Teeth, flashing in the darkness. Red eyes. The squelch of a well placed stab. The sound of bones cracking, reforming. His bones. Someone else’s. It didn’t matter.**

_We are the first line of defense. We must hunt them. We must strike first, before the corruption can spread. We must stop them._

**More memories. They felt shiny, new. He was with other people, like him. Their eyes flashed metallic, and they had marks on their faces. A frog. A lizard. He knew, suddenly, without having to look, that his own mark was a snake. His memories told him that those with marks could be trusted.**

_We are not alone in our profane duty._

**He saw a bright light, it seemed to be made up of hundreds of faces, sliding into each other and shifting apart. It was cold and terrifying and all encompassing. He saw a sword, he saw fire. He knew it was his destiny to hunt, to fight, to kill. He knew there were others. Their destinies were different. But their great purpose was the same.**

_You are approaching a nest. When you reach it, you will know what to do._

**He was in a dark room with damp walls, he knew he was surrounded by the creatures, the creatures that had been humans, but he couldn’t see them. He didn’t need to. He drew a small vial from his pocket and threw it, hearing the satisfying crunch of glass as it hit the ground and shattered. Then a whoosh of flames as all the oxygen left the room; there they were now, their terrible mouths raw and gaping with too many teeth stacked on top of each other, their withered hands pale and reaching. He drew his sword, an infernal alloy of iron, steel, and silver; there were too many of them, but this was his destiny and his duty. He would cleanse this place. And all others like it.**

He was breathing hard, shaking. And suddenly, alone. The only one inside his head. He felt ill, violated and confused. He didn’t want this. But he kept walking, because it was his purpose. His profane duty. That stirred something in the hidden part of his brain, but he didn’t know what it meant and he didn’t think there was any way to know, and so he let it alone. 

At some point, he realized his pockets were heavier than they had been, and attached to his belt was a scabbard that hadn’t been there before. He recognized it from the vision of his past, and he wasn’t surprised. He understood that, when he needed something material, it would appear. He also understood that he had no need for food or drink, and that his body was incredibly difficult to kill. _Except, I must have had my body killed before, or else I wouldn’t have woken up here, like this_. He wondered what had done it, who had done it, if it was one of those creatures. If it had ripped into his body with those terrible teeth. He remembered the people with the marks. The new, slippery part of his brain called them brother. He wondered if they had been with his old body when it died, if they were looking for him now. He didn’t want this body to die, he decided. It was a lot of work getting reacclimatized. 

He kept walking until he felt something in the air change. There were currents, all around him; he blinked. If anyone had been there to see it, they would have sworn his eyelid moved sideways, crocodilian, a third membrane sliding over his golden irises. He was not able to see his own eyes, so didn’t know what it looked like, but suddenly he could see the contours of the air around him, punctuated with the dotted current lines. _Energy. Life force._ It was weak here, but he knew that as he neared other beings, the currents would intensify. It was less like seeing and more like smelling, like an awareness of diffuse particles that taken together clearly meant something. He could sense everything around him, and its allegiance to heaven or hell, its purpose: sacred or profane. 

He was getting closer. 

The burned out cars were closer together here, and more recently abandoned. He could see buildings in the distance, tall and sharp.

 _The nest._ He reached for the currents again, they were clearer now. He could see golden strands, many of them. _Brothers_ . He felt reassured. _Not alone._ Red strands, trembling with palpable fear, and something else. _Anger_. For a moment, he thought it was only the humans and people like him. And then he realized: the inky darkness all around, attempting to overpower the soft glow of human and divine life forces, was not negative space. It was the creatures’ energy signatures, and there must have been thousands of them, somewhere hidden in the city. Waiting. 

He drew his sword and kept walking. 

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Aziraphale crossed himself and brushed the last of the grave dirt off his hands. It was awful work,  _ But important _ , he reminded himself. He murmured a protection over the burial ground gates, really it was the least he could do, and began the long trudge back to the walled city. 

He often reflected on it, how when they had actually been living in the early days, when every city was walled, but the defenses were only meant for other humans, how cozy it had seemed. He thought about the scriptorium, then shook his head. It was better not to. 

He still didn’t really understand how they had gotten here, but they had. It had been a slow fall, really. Heaven hadn’t cared much at first, when it just seemed like a few humans doing bad things to other humans. But, somewhere a several decades on, it had occurred to someone that when there were no humans left, well, they would be rather obsolete. He couldn’t remember how it had all started, if he had ever known in the first place. It was probably miasma, bad airs that had corrupted the first humans, and then well, it only took a couple to cause real problems. There had been wars, all over, the humans turning on themselves, trying to stave off the corruption. It had only made it worse, of course. The creatures were drawn to the blood, after all. 

The smart ones had hidden themselves. Converted the land into farming tracts. Built defenses. It was easier in places that still remembered the old ways. The cities were death traps. He shivered, remembering the times his missions had landed him in among all that destruction and suffering.  _ Not that it’s that much better out here _ , he had, after all, just had to bury an entire family with stakes through their hearts. That was something they had learned early, too. Better not to take chances. Even if it seems like just a fever, you can’t really be sure they aren’t corrupted. In the early days, all the graves had been covered over with iron cages. He still saw them sometimes, in the burial grounds at the more established strongholds. He couldn’t remember who it was that had suggested they just get right down to it with the stakes, but eventually it had become obvious. There was no real time to build grave cages, and besides, the hunters needed all the iron they could get. 

There was so much they hadn’t known in the beginning. First the hunters had used guns, and the humans had just had one of their big blow outs, so there were plenty to go around. He tried to remember what they had called it. It was hard, being ancient, with so many things to keep track of; but then, it was better than the alternative. He knew he was lucky. 

And now he had reached the gates and his reverie ended; he whispered another incantation, and slowly the hundreds of interlocking cogs and gears that formed the door separated, allowing him to enter. It always made him wonder how the humans felt about it, after all, they couldn’t speak the divine language. Were they to leave the walls, it would be incredibly difficult to return. There were a few, every generation. He assumed most of them died, one way or another. 

Inside, he shivered in the cool shadow cast by the battlements. He could see the city center in the middle distance, plumes of smoke rising from kitchens and smithies. The houses were built one on top of the other, a cacophony of architectural styles and materials. Somewhere, sheep bleated. They would be shorn soon, he imagined. That was a good thing about living within the walls, it helped to keep track of time against the human rhythms. He breathed in deeply, trying to identify each of the pastoral scents by name and commit them to memory.  _ Freshly cut grass. Wild mint and rosemary. _ He knew he wouldn’t be allowed to stay here forever, eventually he would have to go back to the corrupted cities, to perform the rites. He wanted to remember, he wanted to be able to tell Crowley about it all-- but no, that thought was too much to bear. He shook his head, as if that could stop the memories rising unbidden to his mind's eye. 

**Crowley, in the early days, a bandolier of silver bullets slung across his chest, black blood matting his hair. A dried trickle of his own metallic blood shone on his sleeve. Sprawled casually among the rubble of a burned out building. Waiting for him, his golden eyes twinkling as Aziraphale approached.**

**“Angel.” His voice was thick.**

**“I’m here.”**

**“I had hoped it would be you they sent.” He whispered it, low and furtive. Aziraphale didn’t know how to answer, couldn’t answer.**

**“Are you hurt at all?” It sounded empty even to his own ears, and he had to look away. He couldn’t.**

. 

**He had arrived too early, and the world was in chaos. There were shouts and the crackling of flames and terrible acrid smoke and screams and horrible squelching sounds. He crouched behind a rocky outcropping, not so much cowering as just staying out of the way. There was nothing for him to do, not yet any way. There were the demons, a small hunting party, in the middle of the street, surrounded by the creatures. He didn’t want to watch, he didn’t like to think about how exactly the scenes of destruction he prayed over had actually gotten to be that way.**

**But, he couldn’t look away. Through the smoke, he saw flashes of metal and flesh. He squinted his eyes shut, wondering how they could even bear to see in the dark and the burning. He opened them again, in time for a small explosion to illuminate a flash of red hair and golden eyes that seemed to glow in the darkness.** **_How did I not notice before?_ ** **And then, he did something very out of character. Something he wasn’t sure he was even supposed to do, only he didn’t really think about it, it was suddenly just happening. He reached up to the heavens in prayer, which in and of itself wasn’t a bad thing, it was in fact the entire purpose of his existence, but this prayer was different. A self-serving prayer, not for the good of humanity, nor for preservation of the world, nor to aid departed souls. An entirely selfish prayer, whispered in instinct.** **_KEEP HIM SAFE. PLEASE._ **

.

**No one had been waiting for him when he reached the burned out ruins. He could smell the death and the smoke, and embers still glinted here and there, so it had to have been recent. It was highly irregular. He awaited instructions, and while he did so, ministered to the dead. He counted the bodies of the creatures he could find, staked, and burned them. He hated it. But, it was his sacred duty. Sometimes there were normal humans left, which was worse. Wrong place, wrong time. He moved slowly through the rubble, taking care with the last rites for each of them; it was the least he could do. They hadn’t really meant to get like this, he was sure. Their souls deserved a chance to depart, to find peace.** **_Peace_ ** **.**

**And that was when he found Crowley’s body, very much dead. Aziraphale sank to his knees, taking the hunter’s head in his lap, and sang a low hymn in that ancient language known only to heaven and hell. This was even worse than when he found the humans, and it was small comfort knowing that Crowley’s soul, at least, was eternal. He would be back. Aziraphale would find him again. He would. It would take time, and it would take time for the demon to trust him. But, he had done it before. He would do it again. He would remember their lives for the both of them.**

**He passed his hand over Crowley’s face, willing his sightless eyes to close, pressed a kiss to his forehead, and stood. He found the profane blade where it had fallen, still slick with the blood of god only knows how many creatures, and placed it on his chest. He began the incantation, his voice only catching a little as he watched them both fade out into that other plane of being, where demons went to be remade.**

**His duty fulfilled, he began the long walk home.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for more violence, blood in this chapter

He realized, suddenly, that he was where he was meant to be. The air had changed again; it hung stale and dark and silent. The sword seemed to hum in his hand, electric and craving. He shivered. 

He knew, somehow, that the hunting protocols would be activated. He didn’t like the way that sounded, but his feet trudged on. Silently, now, though he couldn’t tell you how he was doing it. 

_ Dark spaces, cavernous. Damp.  _ That’s what he was looking for, then. Alright. 

His eyes darted back and forth, reaching for the currents again. He was both in and outside his body, watching himself walk down the deserted street, and at the same time scanning each doorway, each shattered window. Looking for movement, for a glint of eyes. The creatures were here, lurking. He could sense it. He had thought his-- he couldn’t call them brothers, no matter how much that slippery part of his brain wanted him to. It seemed wrong. But he had thought they would be here. He had time to think,  _ Maybe it’s a big place _ , before the first creature bit hard in to his shoulder and was reaching around to claw at his face with skeletal, cold hands. 

And then he was slashing and stabbing and a part of his mind that he hadn’t known existed was speaking to him, guiding him. He could see better now too, he was sure of it. There was the creature, scrabbling in the darkness. 

_ First contact: enemy attacked, wound sustained.  _

_ Wound: Non-lethal.  _

_ Engage enemy.  _

_ Second contact: Glancing blow, stomach region.  _

_ Enemy down. Engage.  _

He wanted to scream and he hurt and he could feel himself bleeding even as his flesh knit closed again. 

The monster hissed and lunged at him, all teeth and claws and the awful stench of decay. He raised his sword and it lunged and he slashed and thwack. He struck its neck, a part of him that he thought maybe wasn’t him kept his arm firm and sure. He was rewarded with a spurt of black blood and a strange, low gurgling. That same part of himself he didn't recognize thrilled at the sight.

And,  _ oh god _ , the sword was stuck, maybe in the bones or the muscles or whatever else was in there, he didn’t know. He wanted to be sick.  _ Third contact: blow insufficient _ . The creature reached for him again with its awful hands, kept at bay by the blade lodged in the meat of its neck. Claws. Hands. Claws. Hands? 

Its eyes focused and seemed to burn and he could sense more of them gathering in the shadows as he struggled, keeping it at arm's length but barely.  _ Odds are worsening. Must engage enemy _ . 

He kicked out, clumsily, and unsure how his body was moving, because he wasn’t telling it to do that, he was frozen and horrified and only wanted to run. He sent the creature sprawling backwards, his blade sliding free with a terrible, slick sound. He wanted to be sick. Maybe he was. And then he was lunging after the creature and throwing himself on it, straddling its chest. He could feel its brittle bones. It hissed again, gnashing its teeth, even as its head twitched horribly, only partially attached. He brought his sword down, again and again, and again and again, and again until the twitching and the gnashing stopped. 

Everything was silent. His head throbbed and he rubbed his face and his hand came away black, sticky and dark with the creature’s blood. He was sick. 

He stood, shaking. He didn’t bother to wipe the blood off his blade. He knew, there would be more. And there was. The awful part of him that  _ somehow knew how to do this _ guided him as he slashed and stabbed and stabbed and slashed and threw hellfire and kicked and bit and bones crunched and blood spurted and then it was finally, blessedly, done. 

He sat for a long time, amid the corpses. He stared up at the grey sky; it still hadn’t changed, at all. He wondered if it was always like this, the first day back. He guessed he understood how his last body had died, now. He looked for the currents again, thinking he might try to find the demons,  _ hell, even the humans _ he had sensed earlier. But their traces were gone, and maybe they hadn’t even been there in the first place. Maybe he had imagined it.  _ Damned lonely bastard _ . 

Something inside him jerked then, the sudden and crushing realization that the creatures, the enemy, had been a human at some point. He scrambled up and wanted to scream and to run and put as much distance between himself and this thing he had done as possible. The big voice had said they were corrupted, that they had done something wrong. 

He wondered what it could have been. 

He wondered what  _ he _ could have done, that this was now his purpose. His profane duty. That hidden part of his mind stirred again. He wondered if it knew what profane meant, if it was trying to tell him something. He felt like he was missing something. It seemed like the kind of word that had another word that went with it. He didn’t know how he knew that. 

He thought about all the different words he knew for a while. It was better than thinking about the way swinging the sword had felt, had sounded when it connected with flesh. It wasn’t a huge list. 

_ Guess I don’t need a brimming fucking lexicon to kill stuff. _

Eventually, mechanically, he cleaned his blade. There was a cloth in his pocket, finely woven and soft. It seemed a shame to get it dirty, but it seemed worse to have to look at all the blood. He wiped his face and hands as best he could too, and when he was done he dropped the cloth and watched it flutter away on a stray wind. He had not received further instructions. 

_ What’s that about any way? Instructions.  _ God, but there was so much he didn’t know. He hated it. It wasn’t fair. If they wanted to make him do all of this, it would be nice to have the consolation of happy memories, to drown out the screams and the smell of smoke and death, at least.

_ Then you wouldn't do it. If you had options, you wouldn't do it _ . The thought came to him suddenly, furtively. 

He hoped it was true. It didn’t  _ seem _ like he would want to murder-- did it count as murder? If they were the creatures? 

_ I don’t even know what the creatures are _ . 

_ Fuck. FUCKfuckfuckfuck.  _

No. He wouldn’t do that. Not if it was a person. But he had done it. 

_ But that wasn’t me.  _

But it had, it had been his hands and his body and, and, and he was shaking again. 

He couldn't stay here, so he didn’t. First, it was a brisk walk and then he broke into a jog and then a run and he was fast and he was light and he didn’t look for any of the creatures and he closed his eyes and kept running and it wasn’t stabbing or slashing and he could almost forget about the awful sword at his hip and the things he had done with it if he just kept moving and moving and moving and so he did. 

He realized, eventually, that the ruined city was behind him, far in the distance. The air was different here, cleaner, and it almost looked like the sky was fading into a darkness that might have been called night. There were plants here. Wild and green and fanning out in all directions undisturbed. Something about that felt alright. 


End file.
